The day feels like it’s never going to fucking end. Is this what prisoners in solitary confinement feel like?
“You need to learn the art of being lazy. Ring the chef again for some more of that popcorn,”Gus says.
He’s taking our captivity far better than I am. He even said that Warin’s room had a cozier feel and a larger TV.
“I don’t know how to just do nothing,” I complain, and Gus makes a chittering noise.
“Snoop around his room,”he says.
“You want me to snoop around in the sleeping vampire’s room? The one who basically kidnapped us?”
“Yes, that’s precisely what I fucking said. He hasn’t so much as moved in his sleep, and to be honest, you’re kind of ruining my movie.”
“Oh, well, don’t let me ruin your fun.”
“Thank you,”he says as I roam around the room, cautiously snooping.
His drawers are organized to a level of neuroticism that I can’t even compute. I’m not sure I’ve ever matched a pair of socks on my own in my life, that’s what magic is for.
I’m even more quiet when I go through his nightstands. Again, nothing special, I’m not sure what I expected to find? Condoms?
Do vampires even need to worry about that sort of thing?
Once I go through most of his room, which doesn’t have much to show for itself, I go to his closet. His suits are pressed and hung neatly on hangers, each of them a different shade of black.
I push a few of his suits apart, and I see a safe. I look back into the bedroom. There’s a few hours until sunset, but I don’t know if he will wake up earlier.
I pull my wand out of my hair and whisper an unlocking spell. The dial moves quickly as I watch the mechanism shift, swirling right and then left and right again.
My brows furrow as I realize the combination to his safe just so happens to be my twenty-first birthday. It’s too big of a coincidence, but I ignore it as I open the heavy door.
The first few items in the safe are the grimoires he’s hiding from the vampire council, which is no surprise. I’m delicate with them as I take one individually, rubbing my fingertips over the covers. I’m not sure what it is about these magical books, but something about them calls to me.
After they’re safely on the floor, I grab the first black box. I glance over my shoulder to make sure that Warin hasn’t stirred before flipping the lid open.
Inside are a variety of what appears to be fake identification documents, passports and birth certificates with differentnames, none of them with Warin Auclair. What takes me by surprise is that there are also falsified documents with my picture on them. I flip through them all, before putting them back in the same manner they were before. Something tells me that my snooping won’t go unnoticed if he looks in his safe.
Beneath the black box is a pink one. If I thought I was confused by a fake passport of myself, I’m even more surprised by the keepsake box filled with items I’ve lost over the last decade, hair clips, gardening gloves, my favorite chapstick, along with what look like PI-like photos of myself wandering around town.
Who is Warin Auclair? What does he want from me? And most importantly, why am I not absolutely horrified by what I found in his safe?
Chapter 19
Ionly started dreaming when Ember joined my bed. Of course, her presence in my bed isn’t in the capacity I wish it was. But as an eternal being, I have limitless patience with the witch who’s fated to be mine.
Right now, my dream is a delectable sense of delirium. The scent of her blood is faint, nearly nonexistent, but just enough for my mouth to water. My tongue burns with the need to taste her, claim her, show her that she belongs to me.
In my sleep I reach for her, and she’s nowhere to be found. Is she safe? She has to be safe in this room. In my room. But what if she isn’t?
The lack of blood is making me slow, it’s hard to wake from my sleep, but I persevere, groaning as I rise from the bed and blink at my surroundings.
“You’re awake,” her melodic voice says and I can’t help the grin that takes over my face. My sweet Ember is safe, and that’s all that matters.
“Did you miss our foreplay-like-banter all day long, sunshine?” I ask her.
The raccoon makes a snorting noise and Ember rolls her eyes.
“More like I was bored to death. I can’t stay in this room forever,” she says.
